


They Are Asking Me to Lead

by dreamlittleyo



Series: Surrender 'Verse [15]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Canon Era, Civilian Life, Established Relationship, Feelings, M/M, Protectiveness, Romance, Secret Marriage, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 10:36:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29899827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamlittleyo/pseuds/dreamlittleyo
Summary: In which Washington makes an unexpected decision.
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton/George Washington
Series: Surrender 'Verse [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/796566
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31





	They Are Asking Me to Lead

**Author's Note:**

> I am woefully behind on answering comments and likely to stay that way for a while, but I still want to thank everyone who has been reading and leaving such lovely feedback on my stories. This series is nearing its end (one more installment to go), but it's been a hell of a ride, and the support along the way has been inexpressibly appreciated. <3 <3 <3

There is a confusing weight in Hamilton's chest as he makes his way home for the evening. He returns not to the large house outside the city where he ostensibly lives with Eliza—and where he happily spends portions of his time when he can convince Washington to join him—but to the spacious apartments he shares with his husband near the heart of the city.

On paper they occupy separate addresses within the same dual structure. In reality they have made the building a home together.

The location is a professional convenience for Hamilton, whose new law practice is located close by. Less pragmatic for Washington, but so long as he remains in the city he must live _somewhere_. They have been careful. So far the rumor mill has not touched them, and Hamilton prays it never will.

That Washington stays in New York for reasons more personal than political is nobody else's business.

Hamilton is still puzzling through what he will say as he shrugs out of his great coat—necessary armor against an icy winter—and hangs it on its hook. He checks to make sure the latch is set securely before moving deeper into the house. Washington is already here. Hamilton is sure he would know it from the intangible sense of belonging he feels upon moving through halls and up stairs, navigating the otherwise empty building. The boots and coat in the entry hall provide more concrete proof, but they are not needed.

He finds Washington in the second floor study, sitting at the massive oak desk that faces the door. Spectacles with round lenses sit on a distractingly handsome face. Washington is squinting a little in the lamplight. The sun has long since set.

"You'll ruin your eyes working in the dark like this," Hamilton admonishes, crossing the carpeted floor to tug the piece of correspondence from between long fingers.

Washington pulls the spectacles off the bridge of his nose and sets them down atop the desk. "I have already ruined my eyes." He sounds maddeningly unconcerned. "And _you_ are quite the pretty hypocrite to chide me so."

"Pretty?" Hamilton offers a teasing smile and ignores the well-aimed volley. The smile doesn't hold though. Too much seriousness has followed him home, and too quickly his expression falls sober.

Washington's wry look vanishes a moment later. "You already heard. I was hoping to tell you myself."

"Never underestimate the efficiency of Albany's rumor mongers." Hamilton tries to sound breezy and utterly fails. Worry drips from every quiet syllable when he murmurs, "You said you didn't want this. You soundly refuted every one of my arguments that you should stand for election. What changed your mind?"

It can't have been anything so simple as one of Hamilton's arguments altering the analysis. Washington has always been slow to reach decisions—downright glacial when the stakes are highest—but once he's chosen his stance, Hamilton has never once known him to change course.

He had not thought it possible, and he can't account for the alteration now.

"Does it really matter why? It's the right thing to do, and in any case the thing _is done_. By this time tomorrow my intentions will be public."

"But you _didn't want this_ ," Hamilton protests again. "You more than earned the peace of private life."

Washington peers up into his face with a gauging sort of intensity. He studies Hamilton, who stands now with both palms braced on the desk, whole body tense with tangled emotion. Maybe Washington is trying to decipher that tangle—Hamilton isn't sure he wants his husband to succeed. His trust in Washington is complete, but he will never be entirely comfortable with the peculiar vulnerability of being _known_.

"Have _you_ changed your mind?" Washington asks in what sounds like genuine confusion. "After everything you said? About my legacy and responsibility to this new government?"

"No," Hamilton admits. "I still believe all of it. I think the experiment will fail without you at the helm. But you were so certain. You made your wishes abundantly clear."

"Then you will simply have to trust that I know my own mind." Washington rises and comes around the desk—leans against it with crossed arms so that he can look down into Hamilton's face at close range. "I will allow my candidacy, and if I'm elected I will work in service to my country once more."

Hamilton straightens and stands tall—still shorter than his husband perched so casually against the edge of the desk—and tries very hard to relax the tension coiling at the base of his spine. He still does not understand _why_ , and the mystery is nearly enough to drive him mad.

"I will need you by my side, of course," Washington says, and he is so obvious in trying to sound casual that it could almost be charming if it didn't make Hamilton instantly suspicious. "Robert Morris put your name forward as the best possible choice for a treasury secretary, and I've seen with my own eyes your economic talents."

That's all it takes for the final pieces of the puzzle to snap together in Hamilton's mind, and he drags in a startled breath.

"You didn't change your mind," he realizes aloud. "You're doing this for me."

Even Hamilton, with his lifelong propensity for words, cannot begin to describe what he feels in the wake of this understanding. Gratitude, guilt, eagerness, anger. He believes in every one of the arguments he espoused before, but he would never have asked his husband to sacrifice so much for his sake alone.

Washington, at the very least, does not try to deny it now that Hamilton has spoken the truth aloud. He must see that there's no point. Never mind that he has never lied to Hamilton's face. He would never succeed at unringing this particular bell regardless.

Hamilton knows him too well.

"Please don't be angry with me." Washington is speaking impossibly gently, and when he reaches out to tug Hamilton toward him, the touch is just as soft. Hamilton allows himself to be pulled in, until he stands between Washington's knees, peering directly up into his face. Washington holds both his hands now, and even the chill of winter can't overwhelm the heat of their palms pressing together.

"I don't think I'm angry," Hamilton says, already feeling that particular reaction subsiding in the face of other things. His excitement at the challenges he will face as a member of Washington's cabinet—because of course the election results are a foregone conclusion—is too potent to leave space for much else. Even his prickly pride and shaky guilt are no match in the end.

He's always known himself to be both selfish and ambitious. Perhaps one day he will try to atone for these shortcomings.

"You didn't have to do this," Hamilton says, even though the words are essentially empty now that he's getting what he wants.

Washington smiles a fond sort of smile and takes Hamilton's face between his hands. " _Yes_ , my boy. I did."

**Author's Note:**

> Here comes my traditional caveat for this verse: George Washington was in fact NOT A GREAT DUDE, and this fic is historically inaccurate far beyond the central romantic relationship. For anyone who is interested in the actual history—especially behind some of the uglier realities of George Washington himself—I have book recommendations:
> 
> * _Never Caught_ , by Erica Armstrong Dunbar (excellent and detailed account of an enslaved woman who successfully ran away from the Washingtons and lived the rest of her life free, despite their best efforts to track her down)
> 
> * _Buried Lives_ , by Carla Killough McClafferty (a solid book, geared more toward younger readers, covering the lives of several different enslaved individuals at Mount Vernon)
> 
> * _His Excellency, George Washington_ , by Joseph Ellis (not as good a resource on this subject as the two above, and still a bit hero-worshippy, but offers a more balanced a view of Washington than Chernow provides)
> 
> * _You Never Forget Your First_ , by Alexis Coe (a newer bio that does a great job of calling out some of the bullshit and hypocrisy that exist in the thousands of books of scholarship about Washington)


End file.
